NEPA: Yet Another Reason the Stimulus is Guaranteed to Fail
Posted February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm in Energy and Environment 
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The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder reports that the environmental lobby is on red alert over an amendment to Obama’s Trillion Dollar Debt Plan from Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY). Ambinder says Barrasso is still a firm ‘no’ on the package, but is proposing an amendment that would exempt any project funded by the plan from a normally mandatory National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) review.
Normally it takes a federal construction projects an average of 4.4 years to complete a NEPA review. Throw in the Clean Water Act’s section 404 requirements, and before a single shovel can hit the earth it usually takes 5.6 years for the average federal project to jump through all the normal environmental hoops.
Barrasso’s amendment would allow any project whose NEPA review takes longer than 270 days to be exempt from the review requirement. Like Barrasso, we’re still dead set against this stimulus plan, but if the left wants to gamble our future with their Trillion Dollar Debt Plan shouldn’t it at least be given a prayer of working? There is no way it possibly can with NEPA still in place.
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10 Responses to “NEPA: Yet Another Reason the Stimulus is Guaranteed to Fail”
LC – Las Vegas on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
I’ve been working in the environmental field for 15 years. Nepa is something I am engaged in on a daily basis. I also live and work in threatened and endangered species habitat.
This article, is accurate and on target, but fails to mention each of these large, “shovel ready” projects will also have to undergo a section 7 consultation with the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
A biological opinion from USFWS not only has the potential to delay a project, it will likely kill most projects, especially in T & E habitat.
Mitigation measures designed to help a project move forward are extremely expensive and in most cases will kill a project before it starts. I know, there are 40 plus applications for, “alternative energy projects” in my office, alone. So much for greening our future. This is the dirty little secret Obama fails to mention during all of his glorious speeches.
He’s got a problem. He ran his campaign on energy alternatives and greening our energy policy and our lives. Problem is, there is nothing at all green about a 2500 acre solar power plant in your backyard, or a wind farm (just ask old Uncle Teddy).
I would be very surprised if any of these projects, even get to put a shovel in the ground. And, if your project is lucky enough to pass the NEPA challenges, and the challenges from the public, you will no doubt need to pass all of the legal challenges when you are brought to court by watchdog groups. Construction is only one hurdle, operation is quite something different.
Our environmental laws have made it nearly impossible for our economy to move forward. Why do you think we’ve not built any new power plants or other energy projects in the US? Drilling? fuggeddabout it! One acronym…NEPA.
Jerry Porter, Fredericksburg, TX 78624 on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
The Federal Government never does anything efficiently or timely except tax and take, and make war. There’s something almost poetic about that since everything it succeeds at involves violence!
richard weirton, wv on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
The blind leading the blind. Is it no wonder nothing ever gets done in America?
len, Alexandria,KY on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
What is the real reason for Obama to come out like ajunk yard dog to yell the sky is falling over the Blaoted so called stymulus bill that was a creation of Pelisi under the influence of Mysterious substances???
Tarp, rushed under the same ” skay is falling” fera tactics has proven to be a flaming didaster so before wasting any more of the borrowed foreign capital at increasingly higer interewst rates why not look at all the components loike 88Mill for Milwaukee Schols that Milwaukee says “not Needed” since enrollment is down 23% and school builkdings are Empty and instead look at huistorical things that actually led to a financial turn around???? and I don’t mean funding Acorn either!
Time to reign in the Dimic RATS plans to destroy America
Thomas Gray South Carolina, on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
Reign in the dimwit crats AND the repungnet cans.
Warwick Wakefield, Sydney, Australia on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
Is it possible, do you think, that some provision will in fact be made to exempt these “stimulus” measures from NEPA holdups? And then, could these same exemptions be applied to other investment projects, real and necessary projects? If so, something good might come from this so called “Stimulus.” Otherwise it seems that it will simply be throwing treasure down the drain.
It is a little early now, but if this ideology-backed action looks like ruining the country then there will be ample justification for civil war.
Tom, Marietta, GA on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
The “Porkulus” bill that is being sold to the American people as a stimulus bill will not work for a very fundamental reason.
If a nation’s GDP consists primarily of service sector and public sector, there is no there there that can be stimulated by increased government spending.
If the aggregate size and cost of governments in the US is reduced and the aggregate total of all taxation is reduced enough that manufacturers who produce in The United States can again be able to compete for shelf space in our own retail stores then perhaps in twenty to thirty years we will again have an economy that can be stimulated by increased government spending. Other than that happening, forget it. Stimulus spending will create the illusion that it is working for as the increased money flow is continued but as soon as the money flow is reduced the illusion will fade and the reality of a worse condition than had existed prior to the stimulus spending will become evident.
Them ain’t chickens comin’ home t’ roost. Them’s buzzards that was hatched in the twentieth century that’s comin’ home t’ roost in the twenty-first century. Just wait until the twentieth century vintage vultures and condors start to show.
Great nations don’t just die. They are assassinated by the unthinking actions and the uncontrolled excesses of their own governments.
Ernest Kurtock Swan River, MN on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
Is old Stupid playing ignorance or trying to Walz when he hasn’t learned the Two Step yet???
(2) questions arise: (1) Is he aware of the cancellation of the fact NEPA will never see the lite of Day??
(2)If he knows it won’t materialize, is it a preconceived awareness that these funds will be absconded with and stuck into some welfare package for instance???
Roy G Callahan on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
This is one of a few good things I’ve seen come out of the Enviornmental Wacko Movement. It’s a nice twist.
Mark Bowser on February 5th, 2009 at 4:03pm said:
My questions are: Why does it take so long for the NEPA to approve a project? Why cannot governmental red tape be avoided by offering bonuses to government and government related workers for quick and accurate work? I am a Soldier. Technically, and literally, I am a government worker. I offer my Soldiers bonuses (not financial) as incentives and you would not believe the accuracy and speed of their work.
I have lived under the NEPA umbrella for a long time. It is not an efficient org nor will it ever be. A safe haven for people who refuse to get a real job. One where they can be held accountalbe for a product and a timeline. NEPA is a fine exaple of this quote “a government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything you have.” Can you believe Thomas Jefferson said that? That’s just amazing.